


A Fist of Pure Emotion

by Sanoiro



Series: Unveiling Gary Preston [2]
Category: Miranda (TV)
Genre: F/M, Fluff and Angst, Major Original Character(s), Not that Graphic but just to be safe, Post-Finale, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-17
Updated: 2016-11-17
Packaged: 2018-08-31 12:52:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 13,999
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8579296
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sanoiro/pseuds/Sanoiro
Summary: Twenty years have passed since Gary's and Miranda's graduation from university. During the reunion function, old friends make an appearance and certain intriguing pieces of information reach Miranda. Apparently, Gary has a lot to explain.





	1. The Reunion

**Author's Note:**

> All the usual disclaimers apply for this fanfiction. Meaning not mine, just for fun and such fun, such fun
> 
> Before you start reading please consider the following:
> 
> 1) This was written in just one day. Originally about 15.000 words in one day that is.
> 
> 2) It was supposed to be a one-shot and then my furious typing decided to prove me wrong.
> 
> 3) I had no plans on ever posting it but I decided to do it anyway (in two places). There are so very few longish Miranda fics.
> 
> 4) It has been properly edited to the best of my ability but English is not my native language.
> 
> 5) I'm not good at writing stories but I do love to do it. In reality, I excel in academic writing.
> 
> 6) I don't expect many views. I expect no reviews to suddenly appear in my inbox and finally I believe that this story will not be noticed much.
> 
> 7) This fiction is not about an emotionally lingering Miranda but about Gary. The first chapter was a necessary evil but I enjoyed writing it nonetheless.

 

* * *

**Miranda**

"Hiiiii! I remember you! The dropped trousers girl!" an uncommonly high pitched voice draw her out of her quite revery.

"How are you doing? Twenty years, can you even believe it! " she mused in a frankly disturbing sweet voice.

Miranda had successfully managed to occupy the hidden corner of the area and had managed to remained undisturbed for the majority of the event. It was the added bonus of being the wife of the owner she supposed. The places she could comfortably retreat and hide, in this restaurant were more enough and thus with that in mind, she had accepted to Gary's proposal to not just host the event but also attend it.

"Twenty already, huh? Who knew?" she mimicked her peacefulness' hijacker tonne of pointless cheerfulness, while she unconsciously tried to distance herself.

"And so many of us did  _good_  if you know what I mean" she practically purred while scanning the bar.

Without waiting for her reply, even though Miranda had none to give, the woman settled comfortably on the chair next to her. She crossed her legs and absently tapped her perfectly manicured nails to the soft cream coloured tablecloth, Miranda had picked for formal functions a few mere months before this torturous evening.

That tapping. It is really remarkable how such a simple detail had Miranda's eyes widening on realisation on who was now sitting next to her. Florence Grantham. If she wasn't already skittish with the proximity of the perfectly proportioned woman across her, she certainly was now.

Florence Grantham was undoubtedly the most well-sought classmate of her year in social gatherings, clubs and of course at the wild parties she always tended to avoid, much to the obvious dismay of Gary. She was the unattainable perfection and she damn well knew it. That was what made dear old Florence, Miranda's personal nightmare.

"So what do you do now Tenty?" Florence inquired while still sizing the men of at the bar.

"Excuse me?" she couldn't get the meaning of this 'tenty'.

"Oh don't be shy now dear!" Florence turned abruptly to face her with a wicked grin gracing her admittedly flawless face. High cheekbones, graced by dark blond curls and gorgeous captivating green eyes. That could summarise for Miranda the beast which seemed ready to devour her. And not in the good Gary-like way.

"Alice told me all about that small incident a few years ago." she practically chirped with amusement.

"A size tenty are we now? Not that I want to be offensive or anything dear but perhaps a few years ago but now? Now, it seems like you might have gone up a few numbers." Florence critically gazed her filling form.

"It comes with birthing children and all that, I guess" Miranda growled her. Her self-esteem for this evening seemed to have travelled back twenty years, from the moment the first guest of the event passed through the restaurant's threshold. And yet for this particular subject, she felt like she could not shrivel in a corner and simply take it.

"Children!" Florence exclaimed loudly.

"I got two boys. One from each marriage that is. My eldest will attend Eaton next fall. His certainly a smart one" she proudly stated and leaned on to add with a wink "They both got that from me".

Miranda shifted on her sit, only for the rubber cushion underneath her to let out a very embarrassing sound. Florence of course raised an eyebrow and thankfully grew a bit the distance between them.

"Miranda!" a joyous chorus claimed their attention, while two men approached each with a drink in hand.

"Matthew Decker and Thomas Beynon aren't you looking jolly this evening!" Florence stood to embrace each while lingering more on Tom's well fitted and obviously more expensive suit.

Both men appeared to be sobering up pretty quickly to Florence's welcome. Moreover, Miranda would have sworn that Tom shuddered as if violated while he tactfully took shelter by her side and behind Matt.

"Well, nice chatting with you Miranda." Florence leaned over her to place a chaste kiss on Miranda's rosy cheek. Yet before she made her way out of what previously was a quiet and comforting corner, she whispered inaudibly for the other's ears: "Yummy alert behind the counter".

Miranda only managed to take a glimpse of Florence taking a place on a stool across from Gary who was serving some drinks to his old Field Hockey teammates. Now this was an unsettling feeling she had there. And yet after seven years of marriage, she could only smile with his boyish grin and push out Florence's intentions for the night.

"So Miranda!" Matt's deep voice rumbled pleasantly. His mop of a hair had descended quite a bit in the past two decades but not his warm and ever-welcoming disposition.

"Five boys and a little lady! Our mate has certainly been keeping you busy." he teased in good-nature.

"What can I say boys, I'm irresistible." Miranda snickered along with them.

These two were her kind of mates. Back in the university days, these two along with Gary. they were known as the Devilish Trio. Always in mischief, yet always innocent enough to not get into real trouble. What also made them adorable was their gentleman ways which they seemed to always use around her. Of course as all good mates inappropriate references always resurfaced after a pint or two.

To this day she remembered Matt as her buddy in research for all things weird and complicated in their Sociology 101 class. Tom on the other hand, was the quiet type. He would just grace her with his presence and more than once he had caught him winking to the ladies along with a swoon-worthy smirk. A man of few words but certainly of plenty numbers - read math - or stairs. From both of which she has a sort of habit to not be able to manage well. Come to think of it, they were always looming over her as her personal bodyguards back then and for that, she would always be grateful to them.

"You certainly are one heck of a lady Miranda" Tom admitted with a sip of his drink.

"But we always knew, did we not Tom?" Matt asked absently.

Tom flashed him a winning smile and crossed his legs while relishing to the quietness of Miranda's favourite corner.

"You know… Back then all the university knew that you had a thing for Gary." he hummed over his half empty glass.

"What!" Miranda shrieked.

Her face was surely exploring several new shades of the colour red, which even Clive would not have been able to name fast enough. Although the temperature seemed to rise, her hands seemed to take a dive to the coldest possible depths of the abyss.

"It's not like you could hide it love!" Matt laughed. "Everyone knew, aside from our clueless boy of course." 

"He was always a bit thick in the matters of love if you ask me" Tom snorted.

"True, true…" all three admitted to their amusement.

Gary was known to be a walking disaster for all things which contained emotions. Something that up to this day slightly bothered Miranda. The time he needed to process his emotions and feelings overall, was unbearably long. As for to act on them? Well, that took ages indeed. Only her and their children seemed to have an immediate process and action of love as of late.

"And yet he fell fast and hard for her, whether he knew it or not, that very first day." Matt seemed to recall a very funny incident as he gulped down some more of his drink.

Miranda's interest peeked at that moment. Their time back at the university was not something they recalled or discussed often, but Gary whenever was willing to talk about that time, he did it with great fondness and a hint of tenderness.

"Do tell…" she playfully pleaded.

"Well you know…" Tom began and his eyes drew shut trying to remember as much as possible from that time twenty years ago.

"First it was the flute." Matt reminded him.

"Ah yes, the flute and then the Karaoke club" Tom added while grunting in a manner that could only be expressed as a painful memory.

"And then, of course, the book and that blasted bookmark, remember Tom? Neon green!" Matt sniggered spluttering his last gulp of ale.

"He still has it I believe…" Tom absently said and handed Matt his handkerchief while rolling his eyes at the antics of his now probably tipsy mate.

"How can you tell? It's been years Tommy boy!" Matt asked Tom in obvious disbelief.

"Come on mate! You can't count your drinks but you can't also notice Gary's notebook behind the counter?" Tom exclaimed in exasperation while winking to a frozen for words Miranda.

"Ya kidding!" Matt raised from his chair and took a better look towards the bar. Surely enough his eyes glinted and shook his head before sitting back down.

"Bloody head over heals I'm telling you." he said and proceeded on taking some of Tom's drink into his glass.

Miranda could not comprehend what the flute, the karaoke or the bookmark meant. In all reality, she could only recall her first meeting with Gary after the door's library was pulled and had her falling all over him. There was certainly a book and as far back as she could remember, that moment had sealed her everlasting crush on Gary.

"Matt" Tom halted his buddy when a suspicion crippled at the edge of his still sober mind.

"Matt!" he firmly called again, nudging this time his friend and causing the last of his friend's stolen drink to spill all over his crisp white shirt. Thank God for undershirts says I.

Tom turned his eyes to her and studied her once more before his frown deepened and turned over to their swearing companion.

"Blimey, she really doesn't know…" he declared in astonishment.

Matt's slightly glazed eyes trained firstly at Tom and then to her only for his eyebrows to almost comically disappear to his now deeply wrinkled forehead.

Miranda once more felt like she was in one of these awkward moments and yet for once she wasn't the one who had caused it. At least she hoped she had not. Fragments of her past with Gary were apparently a mystery to her.

Gary was still behind the counter serving and chattering with people who came up to him randomly while the Field Hockey team now rather tipsy, jested over some distantly familiar game cheers and short songs. She would perhaps have been on the same stool Florence was occupying now if it had not been for the lingering discomfort of the long removed forty stapled stitches at her lower abdomen a couple of weeks ago. Yet in all truth, even without the need for a comfy armchair and a cushion at the restaurant's corner, she doubted that she would have actually been comfortable to sit in the open during the 20th year since their university reunion this evening.

Most of what she was expecting was already happening. Most of their classmates were now in a loose and relaxed mood due to the alcohol, old clubs and teams were renewing the comrade ties even twenty years past their last game, Queen-bees now turned cougars were showing their claws at the most eligible men and as always she was left as unnoticed as she was back in the day. And speaking of cougars, Florence had a disturbing predatory look set on her poor Gary who to her trained eye, had started to fidget and distance himself from that part of the bar.

Tom, who even after all this time could read Miranda easily, came to the realisation that his old roommate was still as insecure as the day he had trained his eyes on the retreating form of that quirky but adorable girl, Gary's words mind you, not his, although they certainly rang true. Following her gaze, he spotted the issue rather effortlessly and signed.

"The Devil to the rescue I suppose." he chuckled and winked to Miranda while getting up to leave their little hideout.

"Darling" he bid her farewell and when he reached the bar he seemed to throw a few pleasantries to Florence which certainly worked as Miranda saw Gary relaxing and poor Tom grimacing when he ordered a double.

A deep amber double scotch was delivered quickly in Tom's ringed fingers. She watched in in a mixture of fascination and amusement as he nursed his drink for courage and in an unfathomable way of diplomacy and seduction he passed a swooning Florence to the bulky ex-captain of the Field Hockey team. With the task completed he met her eyes and cheekily send her a raspberry before he turned his attention to his drink and encompassed Gary to a hushed conversation.

Across her, Matt had been lost in his own thoughts and played with the brim of his now empty glass.

"Gary at first glance seems like the person who hesitates to take action and who needs time to grow a backbone." he softly began.

"Perhaps it was due to what happened with his old man. Let me tell you he was a nasty one. At elementary I've seen shades of purple which I never thought they existed. Never told him I knew, though..." Matt exhaled gravely.

Miranda aware of that part of the story and it was a subject which had born many of Gary's insecurities over the years. And yet he had grown to embarrass the said insecurities and had turned out to be a good partner, a good father and a great man overall.

"I know, but is there a point to even talk about this?" she questioned him. She believed that this matter required great delicacy and when she and Gary had stumbled upon it, it had been dealt with utmost care and even some visits to her ever tolerant psychiatrist Antony.

"I'm not going to delve into this love, I just want to say this. I'm not going to pretend to know everything but I know how it began." he whispered softly as if a great secret was bestowed to her at that moment.

"I'll not claiming that he knew what that emotion was for him before you even met him, Tommy boy and I had no clue either until way down the road." he admitted and he fixed his baby blue eyes on her.

"What I can tell you with certainty is that even now, 20 years later he might be frightful on how deep this was running for him before you even tumbled him on the ground that day."

The bewilderment only grew from there for Miranda. For perhaps the millionth time tonight she sought out Gary's form from across the restaurant and for the first time, he met her eyes with his intensely dark orbs. Tom was still speaking to him on a confiding matter and probably only for Gary's ears to hear. Still Gary's attention was solely on her. The moments of adoration from her husband were certainly not far and in between.

He was a man who was open to affection whether he gave or received it. And yet there were instances when she was perplexed with something silly or when she was focused on their brood when fleetingly she had caught him staring at her with an almost unbelievably deeper short of emotion. Love, affection, adoration, tenderness even lust could not parallel this emotion's depthness and for the first time he didn't turn his gaze in haste elsewhere but it appeared like he was stripping it in all its rawness for her to not only see, but evaluate and examine while taking her time to do so.

 

* * *

 

 

**Gary**

The restaurant was buzzing with energy this evening and he could not have been more content. When the committee had expressed the desire to use a local establishment in the same county as the university to hold the 20th year reunion since his and Miranda's class graduation, it had been a great opportunity to spike up the profits a bit. Years of hard work had paid off and the place was booming. Actually business was so well that they had managed to expand their business with two more small establishments in Bristol and Wick. Yes, he could really see the irony at that. Wick!

When they decided to take this step and risk it all Miranda had simply joked that if they were going to expand why not do it far and wide to the two edges of the UK? It seemed crazy but it actually, against all odds had worked. They had called him a fool but he simply trusted his wife's silliness. It was that silliness that found him today a stable business owner, father of six and as happy as he ever dared to believe in his darkest hours.

"So Preston! Tell us how did you make it?" Peter slurred slightly while leaning on the bar.

"Meaning?" he asked feigning to be clueless.

"I remember that you left like your pants were on fire after the graduation" his old teammate huffed.

"Years abroad I heard Malaysia and Asia in general. So what made you quit all that and get a restaurant? You never seemed the guy who would hide himself away in the kitchen!" Peter drawled and emphatically looked the rest of the Field Hockey team which nodded in agreement.

Gary Preston was indeed a mystery to them. Great player, fast and reliable during their games and practice. Absent from parties and social life in general. Wild yet uncommonly mild at times.

"Well, I wouldn't say that now Peter! How can you forget the awesome muffins you used to sneak from his sport's bag during practice for over two years!" Flynn reprimanded offhandedly.

"That was you!?" Gary fumed gobsmacked.

"Oh yeah… Now they were a piece of heaven let me tell you! And if I could nick one every once in while mate, that was entirely your fault!" Peter dismissed him.

"How so?" Gary asked still gripping the counter as he felt a bit wobbly from that piece of information.

"You had a locker! You didn't use it. Therefore it was fair game. Where did you think the muffins were disappearing to? The elvish muffin world? Seriously mate!" Peter chastised.

"Oh God!" Gary groaned and poured himself a stronger drink leaving the unfinished beer to the small sink.

"I feared that mate!" Flynn shot at Peter.

"What?" Peter now had started to get annoyed over a bunch of long gone muffins.

"I believe that Gary here had a very solid reason for leaving his sports bag at the bleachers." the stocky guy looked knowingly his old teammate.

"And he achieved that purpose Flynn" Tom sniggered at the rush of memories.

"How can you be so sure?" Gary throatily inquired due to the burn of his strong drink.

"Easily. Peter, how did you found the taste of the muffins?" Tom requested without caring to look at the boastful ex-captain.

"Best savoury muffins of all time!" Peter proclaimed with a momentary clarity.

"Never thought you made them, though. I believed it was a girlfriend or something. You had a lot chasing you around at that time. Remember?" he said while wiggling his eyebrows in an attempt to convey a meaningful dirty secret.

"See?" Tom pointed out.

"How did you know?" Gary stared at him with squinted eyes.

"Well, I may or may have not caught her smelling of chocolate…"

"Or raspberry…" Matt supplemented

"Blubbery..." Tom continued.

"Cinnamon and Sugar..." Matt offered his input again.

"And of course Vanilla and Rum while ogling you from afar. Sweet in general and God you were creative with those muffins." he offered in a noncommittal way.

"Yes, Vanilla and Rum is her favourite on Fridays" he hummed pleasantly to his old friend.

"So you got the girl then?" Flynn interrupted them.

"Sure he did. He would be a fool if he did not!" Tom looked affronted to the mere idea of Gary not accomplishing what he had set to do over two decades ago.

"You did right?" Tom asked again consciously now that they had not talked about that subject yet. It was always a very sensitive matter for Gary and Father above he was as ungraceful with the whole wooing thing for all the years he knew him.

Matt set aside his second ale for the night and leaned to the bar to hear his old mate's reply. This was a question which always eaten him up when he was recalling the good old uni days. What had happened? Time between friends is never easy and so both him and Tom had missed a large part of Gary's life since he ventured alone to Asia after their graduation. Up until recently, they both would have sworn that he had settled somewhere, miles away embracing the Buddhist teachings. So sure they were of his inability to find anything close to what he seemed to have experienced during his university days. Dumb and clueless he would tell you if you asked him, and he would know being schoolmates from the third to the fifth grade.

"I did" Gary smiled with little reserve to his company.

"Managed to man up seven years ago actually. She is still the same enthralling creature you saw in that music room 24 years ago." he gently entrusted them with the information.

"I certainly believe that my dear friend. I certainly believe that" Tom exhaled in obvious relief.

"And so will you let us in your current life?" Matt pressed with his boyish twinkle eyes begging for more information.

"Yeah sure… Short version? Yeah, let me think how it goes…" Gary gathered his thoughts and took a sip from his forgotten drink. He coughed at the sudden burn and set it aside behind him. This would have been better suited for a small tap. Changing between drinks was a bad habit of his.

Gary pulled a coaster and set the small tap beer next to him and grimaced a bit when he saw that half of the Field Hockey team was also waiting to be updated on his life story.

"Met again at around 34 and married a couple of years later. Not an easy task to be achieved if you ask me." he would always admit his defeat at the difficulties to curve his emotions and entrusting them to her hands before their wedding.

"And…?" Flynn drawled.

"And we are happily married for the past 7 years." he hastily concluded not wanting to share more intimate details with the majority of his old teammates.

"Children? I have a 12-year-old daughter by the way. Unfortunately divorced now, but remarried to a sweetheart for the past three years or so." Matt slightly pushed him to open up.

"A blessing I'm telling you!" he added when he saw Tom rolling his eyes. Tom always had an inexplicable fear of children but he would never admit openly that his girlfriend's daughter had a strong grip over his whole being. The things he would do for her puppy eyes should have been illegal for grown men as himself.

Gary cleared his throat a bit and enjoyed some of his drink before shaking his head in defeat.

"You will not find a more love-sated husband and father and that's all I'm telling you" he revealed with a small smile.

"Gary…" Tom and Flynn warned together. Matt had resorted looking the ceiling in exasperation. Nothing was ever easy with that man.

"Okay, okay we have six-" Gary gave in but the usual pleasure of sharing the existence of his children always soothed him.

"Six! Blimey mate!" Peter boomed in marvel.

Tom lost his footing off the foot stool, spilt some of his drink on the counter in the process and openly gawked his old roommate. Then he mechanically patted poor Matt in order to aid him to cough the ale out of his lungs.

Gary had turned into that brilliant shed of red which he knew his wife overly loved. It was rare to happen as very little fazed him -commonly his dear wife- and resulted to this colouring. I was his wife's input which made embarrassment such an intimate act for him. Thus, he had to get rid it now as soon as possible.

"Five boys and a little lady. Two sets of twins in there for your information." he added in order to avoid any more embarrassing questions now that their wispiness had started to intensify with each gulp of alcohol.

"Five boys… You are almost half-way from your own Hockey team, or any team on the matter!" Peter gushed at the improbable thought according to Gary. His boys as energetic as they were they seemed to take after their mother's adorable clumsiness. And yet Cliff and Richard were a few mere weeks old so nothing was definite yet.

"Well our family is not inclined to any kind of sport as much as to running around like loons" Gary interjected.

"Six kids, good for you Gary but who is the lucky lady?" Flynn cut in.

"You have five mini-me's but from whom your young darling is taking after hmm?" Peter teased but Gary could detect a small amount of envy radiating from him due to Gurry having fathered five boys.

"Well, if I want, to be honest, our daughter takes after me entirely but in spirit. Lean, abnormally graceful and rather charming according to my wife. Features which came as a great relief to her and that is how we ended up with two more babies. I really wanted to have a daughter which would resemble my wife." Gary mused while accidentally revealing more of his deepest desires than he had intended to.

"Let me guess, the boys have taken after their mother's built but all your charming characteristics?" Tom quipped.

Gary chuckled while he reached for his wallet.

"Curly dark hair, longish nose, handsome boys but yeah they take after their mother…"

He found the latest picture Miranda had snapped a few weeks ago on the first night they had returned with the twins at home from the hospital. It had become an instant favourite and so it found its way to his wallet. All kids splattered all over their bed sleeping atop of his equally sleeping form and the twins nestled at the co-joined bed cradle.

"They seem… longish. I mean they are rather tall..." Flynn observed with an expert's eye.

"Good genes?" Matt mostly remarked mischievously.

"Great genes!' Gary affirmed affectionately and his eyes turned to settle at an apparently empty corner.

"Our two youngest will be 4 weeks old this very weekend." he pointed out the infants to Tom's exploring eyes over the photo he had given them.

Tom licked his lips slowly and nodded still deep in thought.

"She was always a fascinating woman. You did well, exceptionally well if I may add mate." Tom said as he simpered. He left the stool he was occupying for the past hour and softly breathed to Gary's ear only for him to hear.

"Is she here tonight?"

Gary always felt that Miranda's allure -much to the dismay of Stevie- had more than one victim and his old roommate was one of them. At least to a point, that is. Tom's interest over Miranda never reached far or she affected him to the extent it had Gary, but it was apparent that there was still a strong pull which Tom simply could not ignore. Miranda, to the few who could see beyond of what the majority was seeing, she could leave men in a trance for years. It was like a soft hum which followed you and intensified whenever she was near. For him, it had been a full body enchantment which had been his fellow companion for over two decades now.

Gary nodded and wordlessly looked over that unassumingly empty corner again. Tom hummed in acknowledgement and nudged Matt to follow him.

"Tell me now Gary, we all knew there was a certain lady back then but none knew who she actually was. Your fan club was certainly a big one" the gleam in Peter's eyes bothered him quite a bit but he kept smiling knowing fully well that the man was never able to hold his liquor.

"All in good time Captain." he joked and went back on picking the empty glasses which were left on the counter.

"Talking about fans I had a nice sized fan club as well." Peter boasted rather loudly.

"And a good number of creepy stalkers as well, if I remember correctly." Flynn added and tried to remember the numerous rather uncomfortable instances which they had to deal with after each successful match.

"Ohhh" Peter crooned in delight. "Remember Queen-Kong and the blond midget?"

Several members of the old team nodded trying to recall that odd figure which practically lived on the bleachers at their every practice. Tall, awkward and was almost always coming along with a hot blond shortie. Many had attempted to pursue the shortie but alas they were both always gone a good short while before the coach dismissed them. It was like she, no they, had no interest on socialising with them but liked the eyeful they were getting at each practice.

"That girl was a legend Peter" Daryl informed him.

"A legend of what?" he bellowed.

"Apparently she could trip over nothing and she was a bit odd. Weird how she was best mates with our Gary." Daryl told him in a form of caution when Gary made a come back from the kitchen.

"What about me?" Gary encouraged them to continue.

"Don't you remember a girl at the top bleachers?" Peter began

"Always there when we had practice and in every single game?" Flynn confirmed.

"Come on now mate! That freakishly tall girl which now Daryl tells me that she was your friend." Peter queried impatiently.

"What of her?" Gary challenged.

Peter could tell that Gary could remember exactly for who they were talking about. Looking around quickly he decided that her absence could only be a sign of a forced one-sided friendship, which belonged to their now ancient university days.

"Don't you remember that you were trying to scratch that guitar of yours and you would panic every time she was approaching you? Along with your group of fans you also had your own personal stalker mate!" Peter prattled over his newfound revelation, albeit a bit late by twenty years or so.

"Didn't you ask my brother to help you with a song or something you wanted back then?" Flynn said deep in thought.

"I remember it was a cheesy piece, to impress the lady I suppose but you never managed to execute your plan did you now?" he added with a surprised expression plastered on his face.

"No, I never managed to get to that point." Gary all but growled mostly to himself.

It was a time which Gary wanted to be sealed and buried for good. It was his first of the plenty cowering backtracking he would have had over Miranda. Perhaps the main reason he had bought that damn ticket and fled the country right after their graduation without ever disclosing what he was attempting to convey for over two years back then.

"But I'll hand it to you Gary, you got the girl!" Peter cried and a roar of salutes came from the rest of their teammates.

"Peter I certainly got the girl, and she was  _that_  girl!" Gary finally admitted. Up until now, he had never given into the urge to reveal his companion in life.

Neither Peter nor Flynn gave the impression that they had comprehended what Gary what so clearly implied for the first time. The rest of the group had already shipped to another era of pompous hockey songs and distantly familiar cheering mottos. Shaking his head he went back on observing the restaurant and once or twice tried to steal a glance behind the corner only to find this evening's favourite trio deeply engrossed to an easy-going conversation.

"Hey handsome!" a disturbingly familiar high pitched voice greeted him.

"Hey there…" Gary gulped as he remembered how dangerous the woman across him could be.

"Why don't you pour me a drink and then we can have a nice long chat?" she practically purred while drawling on the "long" part. That had him literally climbing the counter behind him to put as much distance as he could between them.

He remembered Florence well enough to want to run for the hills the moment he saw her entering his restaurant tonight. A cruel and close to sadistic girl back then. To the extent of reminding him another time long before Miranda or not even remotely his time at the university. Some scars run deep they say and certain people had the ability to open them raw just by looking at them. Florence was one of them. Manipulative and a common bully for the majority of her stay in the university. In reality, she had never officially graduated. Oh she had received a diploma and all but stories about her practices and reasons of leaving were still hunting the faculty.

"Gary mate, give me a neat double if you please" he heard Tom's smooth authoritative voice retrieving him from the imaginary bushes he had tried to hide into.

"Will Bowmore do?" Gary frowned at his selection.

"1971?" a delighted Tom inquired.

"25 I'm afraid…" he grimaced. He knew that Tom had an overly refined taste when it came to Scotch.

"Will have to do." Tom sighed and put the pleasing seductive mask Gary knew so well.

"Florence! Love! Where were you hiding you pretty little thing, hmmm?" he caressed her with his intoxicating presence. Gary could now only relax while Tom had bitten the bullet for him.

For the course of several minutes and soft murmurs, Tom was lost behind Florence's curls only to gently pass her to a transfixed Peter.

"How did you ever managed that?" Gary caught himself questioning him out loud.

"God-given charisma I'm afraid" Tom chuckled and gestured with two of his fingers for Gary to lean near him for a more private exchange of words.

"Gary you have been holding out with her." Tom admonished. At Gary's perplexed gaze, he rolled his eyes and hissed.

"Do I really have to spell it out? She is unaware of the flute incident or the Karaoke club. What you have to say about that dear friend of mine?" he seethed.

Tom was always the laid back rich boy. He never crossed lines, aside from getting them to bed that is but always with certain firmly planted principles known to his companions beforehand.

"Seven years of marriage Gary and she deserves at least to know that. It will not make you anything less but more than you could ever imagine. But you have to do it soon as now she has knowledge of certain instances which took place 24 years ago." Tom was giving him an ultimatum.

"Tom.." Gary croaked.

"It will be of no real consequence, at least not in a bad way mate." Tom urged him for once again forward.

"She is aware of all she is ought to, yet doesn't she deserve to know the real depth of what is running through you for over two decades now?" his devilish friend stressed.

"Tom you could have had her back then." Gary confided him something that had always tormented him. He knew that if Tom had ever wanted her, he would have never had a chance.

"All these years and you still don't get it." Tom sighed for the hundredth time that evening.

"It was never about me, even if I had ever wanted to pursue her it was always you like it was always her for you. Are you really that dense?" Tom all but scold him and took and healthy swing of his drink.

Gary felt his resolve to keep things under wraps slipping and thus leaving him as exposed as he felt that night. The first time it was a twinkle. The second time it was a forceful nudge. The third he had all but surrendered himself to the pacifying sensation of drowning. Instinctively his eyes found hers and for the first time, he uncovered before her that final layer he had so meticulously wrapped around his very soul. Minutes passed and she held his gaze in equal intensity and resolve. A small smile crept and a husky giggle-laugh escaped him. He guessed it was high time he went through with this.

* * *

**Gary**

He could feel his fingers slowly slide from the well-polished wood and firmed his grip more securely. The markings of time and use had never tempted him to part from it. It was something he always kept out of view. As his teammates had said, it was something which long ago he used to scratch relentlessly in hopes that he would convey what was always left unsaid. He checked it over one last time and placed it on the now dried from spilt drinks counter.

Opting his choices he got hold of an empty bottle of Merlot and fished one of the carefully tucked away butter knifes under the counter. He made his way to the middle of the crowded restaurant and clicked repeatedly the bottle. The effect took some more time than his nerves would have wanted but soon all eyes were on him.

"I know..-. I know that it's customary for the organising committee to give a speech tonight. 20 years huh? Where the time flies?" he rhetorically asked.

"To five boys!" Peter roared from behind him and the restaurant filled with chuckles and a low chatter.

"Yes Peter, thank you, yet you forget the ladies of the family!" Gary clucked his lips in detest at the antics of his old Captain.

"I would like to thank everyone who made it tonight to this splendid gathering and of course the committee for trusting me to be your host this fine evening." he raised his empty bottle in gentle courtesy towards the now rosy-cheeked ladies of the committee.

"Finally, I would like to thank you all for the amazing years we spent together and which today we have come here to revisit in memory once more. Which reminds me…" Gary swallowed thickly and as she had taught him all these years ago, he let go himself to a free fall.

"Allow me to thank our very memorable and loved classmate, Miranda." he once again raised the empty bottle towards the corner he knew his wife was currently hiding at.

"University gave us more than we could ever hope for and certainly more than we perhaps even know of. Thank you!" he concluded his impulsive speech and grabbed the guitar from the counter. The people who tried to stop him for a chat and to clarify what was this speech all about failed to flatter his stepping towards his destination.

He found Miranda in a delectable scarlet hue and with her hands covering her nose and mouth in utter disbelief.

"You just had to rat me out" she cracked half serious and half jokingly.

He smiled impishly and felt a hand resting on his shoulder. Tom had made his way to them and patted him softly on the back.

"Miranda, I have always been honest with you" he began but halted when she raised an eyebrow.

"At least give me credit since Clive's wedding day and beyond" he smirked at her train of thought.

"20 years ago I wanted to give you something but… Well, I failed." he grimaced at his admission of failure.

"Today please allow me to give you something similar. I promise you that when we get back home tonight, settle the kids and take you in my arms before we manage two solid hours before Cliff and Richard demand our attention once more, to tell you about my… Our… First year at university." his words felt flowing with ease and Miranda allowed him to run its curse as it was apparent that he needed to not be interrupted. And yet.

"Gary, we've met during our second year." she confidently said even if she was still calculating for the possibility of being mistaken.

"Technically yes, but not really, no." he whispered and rubbed her knuckles more for his benefit than hers at the moment.

"But what I wanted to do now is to give you what I owed you for the past twenty years." he uttered in a hushed almost trembling voice.

"Back then it was a different one, but it simply didn't seem as appropriate after so many years together." his voice quivered and coughed a bit to clear as much as possible his tightened by emotion throat.

"Just know this. You were never my stalker." he chuckled at the mere idea.

"I was yours. For over a year to be precise."

For the first time in twenty-four years, he felt the same fluttering palpitation at the prospect of catching a glimpse of her. His fingers positioned themselves instinctively to the chords and met shyly her eyes.

 

 

 

 


	2. Our Moments in Time

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Quick Note: The second chapter can be understood as such: Gary decides to give to Miranda what he didn't give her 20 years ago. A song. Through its verse/s we see significant periods of time in his life, mostly during his years in university, and his decisions over his bottled up emotions for Miranda.

**A. What a Flute (1995)**

 

 

> **What would I do without your smart mouth?**
> 
> **Drawing me in, and you kicking me out.**
> 
>  

The campus was certainly a new experience for Gary. The sense of freedom and the possibilities were finally within his grasp and ha had every intention to live it to the fullest. The autumn has setting nicely in the late September and all his recent acquaintances were rather pleasant. The only issue was that he was clueless on what was his aim by actually attending university. What kind of degree he should eventually pursue? Classes were generic for the first semester or so, therefore, he had some time to think over his options.

"Gary!" his roommate called behind him, distracting him from his window's view.

"Got the pamphlets, care to take a look with me?" Tom was his exact opposite. He knew where he wanted to be in ten years from now and what he needed to do to get there. A degree majoring in Economics and a minor in Management was all he cared about really.

"So what do we have to choose from?" Gary eyed the pack Tom had unceremoniously thrown on the common area table and started measuring his options for something which would not affect his future too drastically.

Tom had already gone through most of the pamphlets and he had an idea on how he would have liked to pass his free time.

"Now that seems interesting…" Gary picked a light green paper.

"Seriously Gary?" Tom groaned. Joining the university's band and worse even, the orchestra was not on the top of his list on having fun.

"I could practice my acoustic guitar skill and it doesn't seem and an exerting activity" Gary contemplated on the idea and looked that Tom who previously had all by scoffed at the idea to be warming up the suggestion a bit.

"Well, I do have some wicked charisma when hitting the ivory keys…" Tom tapped his chin deep in thought.

"It's in an hour!" Gary exclaimed and turned to his now groaning again, roommate.

"Marvellous." Tom caustically reprimanded gathered the rest of the pamphlets.

Gary was still reading one of the pamphlets he had managed to take off his roommate's hands when Tom's smooth voice questioned.

"So are you coming or not?"

The music room was certainly spacious and the odd notes complimented its acoustic value. The students who had turned up for this kind of "activity" were chattering away and none gave the two first years a second glance when they got their seats at the very far end of the room, right next to the door.

"Told you it would be packed" Tom whined.

"Oh hush now mate. Don't you want to check the piano over there?" Gary recommended as it seemed that everyone was testing their instruments.

"Pass"

Gary rolled his eyes.

"Please quiet down" came a shrill from the door and they both effectively jumped.

A middle-aged woman in a hideous plaid two piece walked down the stairs and took her place in from of them.

"Ehm sorry mates, may I get the sit next to you" a heavy North-east accent whispered.

"Yeah sure" Gary folded his legs and nudged Tom to do the same.

"Name is Matt. Matt Decker. Bass guitar." Matt lifted his guitar case for effect Gary could detect his nervousness.

"Matt Decker... Gledstings Elementary?" Garry asked in astonishment.

"Gary Preston, remember me?" he smiled to the newcomer who had indeed recognised him.

"Thomas Beynon, charmed" Tom said in a bored voice without ever looking at Matt.

Gary nudged him harder this time.

"Fine, fine! Tom Beynon." he hissed but gave a nod of acknowledgement to Matt.

Several students had already been in or out of the band and the orchestra respectably. The decision of the instructor was never once challenged and Gary in all his nervousness tightened a chord a bit too much. As a result, it snapped with a very ugly screeching snap.

"Damn it!" Gary cried out. One of his fingers had been slightly caught in the way of the snapping chord but he already knew that it would just bruise badly and that no blood had been drawn. He knew what pain would result to which after all.

He bent down to examine the damage and to his relief, it was the chord for which he had a replacement tucked in the guitars case. He lowered himself to the floor with his back to the instructor, who could not see him either way and with expertise began to changing the chord.

A chimed off-tune flute sound took his concentration momentary from his task but he was back in no time albeit his chest rumbling with an involuntary giggle.

"Miss Hart! In all my times I've never-..! You render me speechless!" the conductor screeched.

Gary was tempted to look back but the chord needed some critical adjustment before he could hide his tools.

"Miss Hart I requested you to leave in orderly fashion what is that?" the conductor's voice broke through the room again. At that point, Gary started to have some reservations regarding how much he wanted to hear that voice twice per week.

"I gallop miss!" a throaty baritone yet feminine voice declared for the world to hear.

"Excuse me Miss Hart?" a shocked conductor asked.

"It's a gallop! No human should ever run except if it's by profession or if it is a child." she strongly kept her ground.

"Oh, Miss Hart, with that naive optimism, you gallop, girl!" the conductor said in exasperation dismissing her while Miss Hart continued galloping up the stairs.

Gary had frozen in place. There was a numbness followed by a deep earth-shuttering twinkle deep within him. He had just enough time to snap his head up and see the galloping retreating form of a tall, awkwardly moving girl. Her hair raised and drop with each gallop and when she made it out of the room she threw shakily her hands over her face and intensified the speed of her retreat.

He would never know for how long he had remained on his knees, looking at the now wide opened door but Matt would have told him that it was for about a quarter and during that time he had missed his surname being called thrice. Tom's calculating gaze, on the other hand, would have supplied him with a, 17 minutes and 46 seconds.

 

* * *

 

**B. What a Nudge (1995)**

 

 

> **You've got my head spinning, no kidding, I can't pin you down.**
> 
> **And I'm so dizzy, don't know what hit me, but I'll be alright.**
> 
>  

The air was slowly becoming smokey with the heavy aroma of burning wood that the chimneys had worked out of them since the temperature had dropped in past few days. Gary fixed his coat and scarf over his mouth and nose, left a few pounds for his beer and started walking back to his dorm.

It had been a week since he had last seen her. It was a nuisance really. He didn't even know her. No name aside from the 'Miss Hart' and that had seemed enough for his traitorous thoughts. A passing interest was not something new to him but the ever so lingering feeling was uncomfortably new.

Something hard collided with his back and had him falling crashing down on the ground.

"For flip's sake Tom!" Gary growled to his roommate and the bass lover.

He dusted off the moist earth from his knees and picked with disgust the equally wet leaves from his coat and scarf.

"See Matt we have something for him and he is ever the ungrateful sod!" Tom slickly dismissed him.

"Well Tom I believe that it's his loss then" Matt agreed suggestively.

"What are you two muttering about now?" Gary watched them in suspicion.

Tom approached him clucking his tongue like when he was approaching a difficult conquest to be if a woman could ever be difficult for Tom that is.

"I believe that we have found you the perfect activity." Tom merrily let him know.

"Field Hockey!" Matt shouted.

"Hockey?" Gary alarmingly repeated.

Tom took a drag from his cigar and letting out a puff he gathered him close with his right arm.

"I had to take the pianist position because of you. Now be a good boy and try this." he threw him the same pamphlet he was reading just a week ago before they had gone to the music room.

By Thursday evening Gary had been persuaded to give field hockey a try and albeit reluctantly attained the tryouts. To his surprise, the game was pleasant and reverted his focus away from the stress of class, impending decisions and galloping girls.

"The newbie has potential, coach!" the third year Captain shouted to the bleachers where Matt was whistling widely and Tom had settled leisurely drinking from a small leather bound flask. Both of his friends raised their thumbs up at the Captain's exclamation. Tom then raised his left arm to check his watch and smirked devilishly.

"Numbers 5, 17, 2 and… 10, pass and are officially part of the team although benched until further notice." the coach yelled over the field.

"Practice is mandatory three times per week and newbies take part only for the first half it. Questions? No? Dismissed for today!"

"You did well today mate!" Tom relished over Gary's excitement to have joined the team.

"Tom what do you say we celebrate this with a beer or two" Matt recommended pointing a small pub at the outskirts of the field.

"Well, I'm a bit tired and…-" Gary had relieved the tension of the week by pushing himself to his limits that evening.

"Nonsense now! A pint will certainly refresh you. You have no classes on Fridays, remember?" Tom's eyes sparkled and Gary decided to comply just this once.

As they approached the pub the door flew open and smashed full blown on Gary. The pain blinded him and he could feel the old well-known feeling of something trickling to his mouth and when he tasted the rustic taste, dizzily realised that his nose was bleeding.

"I a Sir?!" a trembling voice reached his ears while he was now leaning on the cold stone behind the pub's entrance. With difficulty, he saw a familiar figure making her way to the dorms through the hockey field. She had obviously not realised that someone was behind the door or that he was currently almost doubled in pain.

'Oy!" Matt yelled to the pair and they stopped to look back. The night air was chilly and he could tell that it was dark enough to not notice him just yet.

"' 'ush" he urgently croaked and tagged Matt's trousers.

Tom looked him with an incredulous look on his face and then kicked Matt.

"My bad sir" Tom helplessly shouted.

"You looked familiar!" Matt lamely finished.

"I'm not a Sir!" a broken voice bellowed.

Gary just stood there in a haze of pain and amazement. The giggles started rumbling low and exploded to a full roaring laugh. A really painful but exhilarating roaring laugh. What a forceful nudge that had been!

 

 

* * *

 

**C. What a Karaoke Night (1995)**

 

 

> **What's going on in that beautiful mind, I'm on your magical mystery ride.**
> 
> **My head's under water, but I'm breathing fine.**

 

It had taken almost two weeks for the stuffiness to be gone completely and for Gary to be able to stop hiding under a thick scarf, half of his face from the public. If he believed that something was different lately he all but now had confirmed it but he was still not willing to embrace it. It still was illogical and too forceful for his mellow nature.

"Mr Preston, please do make us a favour and share what you find so amusing while I'm summarising Urri's, 'Theories of Revolution'?" the professor sniffed annoyed by his very presence.

"The sociology of envy?" Gary looked helplessly at Tom. It was the only class they had together and mostly because social relations according to Tom were baffling. Luckily the only part Tom had cared to discuss with him was about a nice section of the textbook regarding, what else, envy.

"Yes, Mr Preston perhaps you have the right to be amused after all. Moving on-.."

Gary tuned the lecture out and started doodling on his notebook.

"Up for a pint after practice?" Tom nagged him once again. Since the incident, he was avoiding that place as much as possible.

"Come on I doubt that she will even be there again after the whole Sir ordeal" Tom insisted.

A choked giggle escaped him and earned him a glare by the professor once again.

"Nor do I think you have to open the pub's door, let me do it for you, my fair maiden" he mocked him.

With the probability indeed low he reasoned that a pint would be a good way to finish his day so he slowly nodded.

The practice was harsher now that the cold had set and especially on Thursdays when the grass was still wet from the morning's watering. All that had made the prospect of a beer all more appealing to him. When they entered the pub, Tom had opened all doors as promised followed by a little bow of mockery, he shivered by the warmth of the place.

For a Thursday night, the pub seemed almost full and so they had to take the further corner which was lacking the light and the warmth of the rest of the establishment but it was still a rather cosy. Matt quickly returned with two blond ones and a black Irish for Tom. That guy would only do black for some reason. Black clothes, blackish drinks and had a disturbing appetite for a double serving of black pudding every single morning. Gary shuddered and focused on the movement at the well-lightened side of the pub.

"It's karaoke night!" Matt observed in delight.

"Indeed it is…" Tom said with feigned astonishment.

Gary knew this had been too good to be true. He had become the toy of two manipulative-

"And now couple number 7 to the stage Stevie and Miranda!" a short chubby guy announced and serval clapped to the two women who had thrown their hands to the air.

"But wait we have a request first. A solo by Miranda." the guy's voice seemed to hold a worrisome false cheerfulness.

"Miranda Hart!" he dejectedly announced and the girl who had plugged him with so many foreign thoughts took the microphone.

What followed would forever mark him. It seemed that the flute was not the only thing she was off tune with. Regardless of her tone-deafness, she sang with passion the cheesy lyrics and while Tom and Matt wore identical grimaces of unimaginable pain, he hummed while his chest rumbled in contentment along with her singing. He could feel himself slowly slipping and being surrounded by something unfamiliar. Only one thing could stand true for his life after tonight. Gary Preston's soul would never be the same again.

 

* * *

**D. What a Hart (1996)**

 

 

> **You're crazy and I'm out of my mind. Love your curves and all your edges.**
> 
> **All your perfect imperfections. Give your all to me I'll give my all to you.**
> 
>  

When he was sixteen he had been offered a chance to leave this heavy emotional burden behind but he always backed down in the end. At the age of eighteen, almost nineteen, he thought that perhaps the time had come to move forward with that change. It was not going to be life altering but perhaps he would regain control over his own identity. Lately, he could feel a slow change happening under his skin and everything pointed that such a decision was fitting to happen now.

The summer break would be over in a couple of weeks and the campus was slowly returning to its normal busy self. He toyed a bit with the envelope and with determination strolled leisurely to the city's public office.

"Excuse me madam?" he tapped his fingers on the glass.

"How can I help you?" came the trained reply of the woman behind it.

"I'd like to submit this application for processing today" he easily said and motioned the envelope towards her.

The public officer opened the file, took out her glasses and set them low on her nose. Humming she thinned her lips and looked back him with a brilliant set of dark grey eyes.

"Are you sure young man?" she calmly inquired him.

"Can not be more determined about this, madam."

"It can be processed rather quickly and you will have to fill an application for a new… oh here it is. All prepared now aren't we?" she praised him.

He simply smiled and could feel himself feeling lighter by the minute.

"I have a daughter, if I had relented to her pleas, she would be submitting the same application twice per week, for the past three years now" she chuckled.

"Here you go, Mr Gary George Preston!" she bid him farewell by giving him back the slip for the retrieval of his new I.D.

"Thank you madame!" he grinned widely at her and placed the slip in his wallet.

He was ready to embrace the day again when curiosity took the better of him.

"Excuse me madam…-" he felt ridiculous but he had the urge to ask.

"What's your name?"

The public officer took off her glasses and grinned at him.

"Penelope Hart, Mr Preston. Spouse to Charles, mother to Miranda. Will that be all?" she teased.

Gary should have had stopped struggling already and surrender to her. It was impossible to avoid it anymore. With a nod, he left the building and headed back to the campus.

The days passed fairly quickly and Gary thrived under his new name. Classes seemed to make more sense than ever and although he still was unsure of where university was actually leading him, he fell into a comfortable routine of taking classes, letting out steam through his hockey practices, relaxing every Thursday night at the pub during its karaoke night and recently he had even applied for some cooking lessons on campus.

Hockey had proved to be a good distraction though he was satisfying his craving from the shadows of the dimly lighted pub shortly afterwards. Always off tune, always cheery. Tom and Matt still accompanied him but never demanded any reasoning from him. They would just settle quietly, drink a glass or two and as of late, they had invested on earplugs. Gary simply was rolling his eyes every time and was sinking back to the wooden booth trying to soothe his aching muscles.

October rolled in and his first cooking class was on a chilly Saturday morning. He rolled off the bed and made his way to campus. Humming slowly he fished the instructions for the class and noticed that he had to pick a book in order to attend this morning.

Reaching the library's door he pulled only for the door not to budge. It was stuck again he presumed and pulled harder only for a large person to topple him down the stairs and on the freezing ground.

"Good grief! Why were you pulling?" the person on top of him groaned and hit his now aching shoulder.

Finding her balance Miranda tried to get off the man she had obviously crashed underneath her only to find him limp and with closed eyes grinning.

"Hey, are you alright?" she poked him with the edge of the book on the ribs and he squealed. Actually squealed like a four-year-old!

He opened his eyes and his dark gaze settled on hers.

"Is my nose bleeding?" he asked her abruptly.

His angular nose was perfectly fine, as well as everything else she could see without ogling much.

"Are you sure you are alright?" she asked again and patted experimentally his scruffy cheek.

He chuckled and jumped upright. He was in the process of dusting himself when his eyes focused on the book he was carrying.

"Cooking class at 9?" he tentatively asked.

"Attempting a cooking class at probably 9, to be honest" she joked with some uneasiness of confessing that she obviously lacked greately in the art of cooking.

"Me too! Want to wait me grab the book and go together?" he charmingly asked her.

She had to admit that she was slowly swooning.

"Sorry." she mumbled, now that was embarrassing.

"That's okay, another time perhaps." he hurried and clumsily tried to open the library door once more.

"Last copy!" she yelled at him and he gave her the most adorable crooked grin she had ever seen.

 

* * *

**E. What a Farewell (1999)**

 

 

> **You're my end and my beginning. Even when I lose I'm winning.**
> 
> **How many times do I have to tell you, even when you're crying you're beautiful too.**
> 
>  

The years passed and graduation was upon them. Much to Tom's dismay Gary never acted upon his feelings directly but seemed to have established a very warm and extremely close relationship with Miranda. To Tom's amusement, Miranda never got the art of cooking and was basically refrained from ever touching anything else than a kettle and that only under Gary's supervision in and out of the cooking lessons.

"Tom, do I really have to attend the graduation" Gary whined from his bed.

Tom glanced over at Matt and winked him while fixing his cufflinks.

"Gary boy, you either claim something or is leaving you. Your choice really." he plain out warned him.

"I got a degree in management and I have no idea what I want to manage!" Gary miserably lamented.

"Damn me and my need for some company during class hours." continued mumbling.

Tom signed and took in his friend. He had followed his path out of no real idea what to do with his time at the university and although he majored in Managment he still had no clue what to do with that. Perhaps he should have taken his lead all the way, majoring in Economics and minoring in Management. But that boy had to always do the exact opposite!

"Hot date tonight again?" Gary signed while watching him going a bit over the top with tonight's outfit.

"A hellish hot one my friend" he bragged.

"You have taken literally all the campus Tom who has escaped you?" Gary thoughtfully asked him.

"Here is where you are mistaken, dear Gary. All but two." with his cuffings in place, he gave himself a last look over the mirror, took his grey coat and gave Gary his trademark seductive smirk.

"Stevie?!" Garry abruptly came to the realisation.

"She will eat you alive! You said it yourself mate, too dangerous to meddle with. Small but deadly. The alluring deadly demon of all little people and so many other imaginative descriptions. Your words Tom, not mine." he protested.

Tom set his coat over the nearest chair and walked back to Gary. He was a fearsome man when he wanted to be but at the moment he was evaluating something. When he seemed satisfied, he took a step back and retrieved his coat opened the door and stopped once more.

"Guess again." he softly prompted.

Gary's fists closed abruptly to the door obstructing it from closing.

"You have no right." he faintly protested.

"I've waited four years Gary and all you do is tiptoeing." Tom's voice was gruff and held an earnest apology.

He was at loss and buzz was drowning him slowly.

"Waited for what exactly? A date, a chance?" he snapped.

Tom signed once more and pushed Gary slightly back in the room.

"I don't see that far. And as we know neither do you Gary." he tried to reason himself that he was doing the right thing tonight.

"It may lead somewhere down the road or simply as far as her bed sheets tonight" he hypothesised out loud how things could turn out this evening.

Four years is an acceptable time to believe you know a person. To believe that you know their values and their limits. You believe that there is little more to discover but of no great consequence. Thus when Gary's finger's found their way to his throat squeezing mercilessly, Tom was more than surprised. What stricken him more was the crazed look in his dark eyes, so unfamiliar to his meek and full of mirth gaze.

As soon as it had begun it was over. A look of disbelief took the place of his crazed expression and Gary retreated slowly back to the room. He quickly closed the door and locked with shaken hands. The trembling never ceased as he fell with his back vertically behind the door. Tom never knocked and Gary heard only the retreating sound of his custom leather shoes.

When the graduation day came upon the campus, it found Tom alone in his dorm room holding three letters of farewell and one request of forgiveness.

 

 

* * *

**F. What a Scotch (2008)**

 

 

> **The world is beating you down, I'm around through every mood. You're my downfall, you're my muse.**
> 
> **My worst distraction, my rhythm and blues. I can't stop singing, it's ringing, in my head for you**
> 
>  

The tranquillity of the view outside his window never ceased to amaze him. All his life was looking out of windows searching for peace and usually he was alone. Asia was not what he had imagined it to be. It was more and it offered the much-needed distraction he needed. Malaysia was his latest resting port for the past five years and it offered him the freedom he always had wanted as a child.

"Ghary, special three, two portions on table 14!" grandma Ayu yelled at him from behind the counter.

With the expertise the last decade had given him while he was meddling with ingredients over stoves around Asia, he had the order ready in a more than a respectable time. At the end of his shift and before the restaurant closed, he had to clean the kitchen and prep certain ingredients for the next day. This was supposed to be the easiest part of his day but in reality, it was the most soul-wrecking hour for him. His mind was left idle to remember, wonder and regret.

After a couple of years he had given in and began to seek ways for his attention to waiver and any kind of diversion was welcomed. Alcohol had been his favourite way to suppress not only emotions but also the need for physical gratification. Yet as the years rolled he decided he could no longer hold at bay his physical needs over a mirage.

"Closing in about an hour, up for some drinks?" the new cute waiter proposed to him for the second time this week.

His time was spent between exploring new places, learning more about cooking which had become the sole purpose for his existence. Although more often than not he had fleeting adventures which could be described usually with just one word in each instance. Fascination, attraction, loneliness and mainly lust. Love was never an emotion but a word. It held nothing sacred for him so he used it freely as he ventured through life.

"Sure love, yet I feel the need for something strong tonight. A scotch perhaps?" he licked his lips knowing fully well that a scotch was what would pacify him tonight and certainly not the girl across him.

She humphed but then shrugged. She most probably would not be joining him then. The best scotch that suited his pallet could be found in one particular establishment at the upscale part of the city. Nothing casual or promising about that so he could not really blame the girl.

About an hour afterwards he had found himself with a fresh shirt and dress pants sipping his drink of choice while he hummed in relief.

"I'll have what he is having!" a familiar deep voice order from the stool on his left.

It had been over ten years since he had last seen her and tonight that he had resorted to an overpriced glass of Bowmore, he of all people had to come and find him in Malaysia's Ritz-Carlton.

With a sigh, he turned to leave but he really wanted to finish his drink. Once per year he caved into the need for a good glass of scotch, same brand same quality as his old university roommate was always keeping next to his textbooks.

 _"When life seems to want to swallow you whole Gary, have a Bowmore. Life cannot swallow what has been touched by hellfire."_  he always told him after they had shared a drink from his private bottle.

"Tom" he wryly acknowledged him.

"Gary" he pleasantly greeted.

The bartender came with Tom's glass and he took a hearty gulp.

"Bloody hell mate! A 25? Are you joking me?" he irritably protested.

Gary turned looking at him with an unreadable expression.

"That was in your personal stash Tom."

"At my early twenties Gary. At university! Not now.. You disappoint me beyond belief" he sadly admitted.

"Not much have changed then Tom" he argued.

"Talk about yourself." Tom bite back.

"Work, family, kids?" Garry absently asked.

"All three actually." Tom noncommittally replied.

"Good for you then" Gary swirled his glass. This was going better than he had ever imagined.

"Two kids. Lovely wife." Tom shrugged.

"Mmmmm…" Gary hummed.

"Who knew she would have made such an excellent mother and partner." Tom added without missing a beat.

Gary's hands stilled, all he could see was his face blanching at the mirror over the bar's counter. Within the bottle and the glasses, there was a dreadfully looking man. Himself.

"Whom? he pressed roughly in voice and emotion.

"Her" Tom replied like it was the most natural and expected answer for Gary to hear.

He could not pinpoint the moment his fingers closed to trembling fists. Distantly he felt something drip slowly from his face and burn his eyes. The commotion around him also left him unaffected. A buzz he had not heard for the past ten years was back full force but instead of seeking out to wreck walls down, it remained docile and spread a numbness to places he never thought they existed. Places that even in his most shamefully enraged state had never realised they were there. These places were now pulsing and slowly tearing from the inside-out.en

The next time he blinked he knew where he was. The white ceiling and the smell of the sterilised space was welcomed as he tried to sit up.

"Stay down!" Tom barked at him.

Perceiving his surroundings he found a loosened tie Tom above him. His left hand was bandaged and an IV was placed on his right arm. Confused he turned to Tom.

"For the first time let's talk out in the open. No more hiding. Okay?" Tom pleaded.

He could only nod at his former best friend.

"First of all, I have no wife, no children and for all I know, Miranda is still at the same town we left her."

The dissolving tension which Tom watched leaving Gary was all he needed to know.

"Second, have you done anything about your PTSD?"

A nod from his now terrified mate had him cursing to all things holy.

"How did you know?" Gary rasped.

"Come on now Gary! Aways mellow, avoiding emotional stimuli like hell and losing control when on pushed on edge…" he briefly recalled all the signs that were there and never before had addressed them properly.

Gary looked away in shame only to stare back to Tom when he concluded his thought.

"But not really losing it either." Tom pondered this as he had done for years.

"Gary why did you attacked me back then?" he slowly asked him.

"Anger?" Garry tried to guess.

"I'd say perhaps anxiety over me hurting the object of your affection. And tonight?"

"I can't recall Tom. Does it even matter? Good grief it's been 10 years next month!" Garry growled weekly due to the sedative entering slowly his bloodstream through the IV.

"Grief, well aren't you ever the intelligent one?" Tom mused and patted his shoulder.

"I have a deal for you Gary." he dragged a cigaret from his suit's inner pocket and although he refrained from lightening it, he still put it between his lips. "A devilish deal if you like."

Garry was slowly going under and Tom knew that he didn't have enough time to play around with him no matter how much he wanted to.

"I'll put it plainly Garry. You will be on the first plane to the UK with me at our earliest convenience."

With eyes still clear, Tom could see that he had him where he wanted him.

"You will go to therapy again and by God, you will be unstoppable afterwards." Tom swore mostly to himself.

It had taken him a decade to trace him down. The odd postcards he was sending to Miranda certainly gave him several hints but it was only after he discovered that Garrison Preston Junior had officially changed his name to Gary during their second year, then all pieces fell into place. An abusive father could do wonders and Tom was, unfortunately, aware of that by personal experience.

 

* * *

**G. What a Solid Thirty (1988)**

 

 

> **Cards on the table, we're both showing hearts.**
> 
> **Risking it all, though it's hard.**
> 
>  

This November was unusually warm, the little boy though as he noticed the lack of frost at the misty garden outside the window. Last year there was some snow scattered around. His legs moved beneath the bed he had been placed at hours ago, but if he wanted to be more precise it was but twenty minutes prior. He was a difficult sleeper as far as he had heard the nurses lament.

Due to the circumstances, by now he should have hated all things white and sterilised but on the contrary, it provided him with a sense of comfort which he rarely had felt outside of these four walls. He had always been full of energy and that would explain why his legs were moving aimlessly while not touching the floor. Or why he had started fidgeting out of plain old boredom. At least that was what he was willing to admit at the moment.

"Now if you can come through here please and sit for a while." he heard nurse Chummy ushering someone at the bed next to his after dragging sharply the dividing curtain. With the curtain still drawn, he could only tell some shapes of his new roommate but that was about all. Kids usually came for a couple of hours to a couple of days and then they were gone. He was the only thing to be constant these past few months.

A huffing sound like a teapot chiming sounded from behind the curtain and his curiosity took the better of him. He edged to the corner of his bed and tagged a bit the light blue shaded material to take a peek behind it.

"Well hello there!" a joyous voice greeted him and he took a step back startled effectively leaving the curtain fall once more.

He was more than used feeling weary of new acquaintances but the voice's owner cheerfulness was somewhat unsettling for him. He automatically tried to shrink a bit to the other side of his bed as expecting for the person at the other side of the curtain to tag it away and expose him to their evaluating stare. It would have been the first time after all.

Instead, he saw a finger tracing the middle of the textile while leaving small waves in its path.

"I love playing with shadows!" the now more defined figure, by the first morning light, babbled.

"What about you?" the voice carried on with the same upbeat manner.

"I guess…" he mumbled. He had a hard time understanding this concept of playing.

"That's how I ended up here tonight, or is it today? I can't really tell" the voice jested.

"Broken arm! Can you believe it? You try to make a giraffe and then the floor claims you! Unheard of! Well, mum says the last one at least…" the tone was now lower and mumbling.

Gary took more of the shadowed form behind the curtain. It seemed like a child but much older than him. Yet he was always a scrawny little thing as his dad grumbled in destain after he came back from the pub.

"It will take at least six weeks!' Gary informed the figure with a know-it-all attitude. If he knew something that was bones all right.

"Oh" came a dejected sigh.

"You too then?" the voice asked curiously.

"Yeah lots!" he replied with a mixture of pride and shame. The need of him to take the lead was there but also the shame of how that "lots" had come to be.

The figure stood from the bed and in apparent hesitation, fisted the curtain's soft material. Gary gulped and expected for the well-known sharp tag. But it never came.

Now before him was a girl with the only thing exposed to his view, her eyes, forehead and crazy bed hair.

She had purposefully hidden her face and body like the girls in his 1001 Arabian nights book. He cocked his head and he could feel a pleasant rumble growing at his chest.

"You are…" he demurred uncertainly.

"Tall? Yeah, I know.." the girl disheartened grumbled.

"No…" he drawled in amazement. "Funny!" he squealed and surrendered himself to a fit of giggles.

The insecurity in the girl's eyes was instantly gone and she lowered the curtain to show her long face.

Her smile was brilliant Gary remarked and she took her tongue out in a hilarious salute.

He was still heaving from the most inexplicable experience of his life so far. The way that girl was carrying herself, the way she talked and the mirth in her eyes had him undone in laughter without even a single peep.

"Well, if I say so myself, my teachers always said that I was a funny child. Not sure if it's a compliment, though" she remarked while making a serious face as if she was actually thinking about it.

"I like to gallop at the corridors you see! I believe that one day we will all gallop!" she whispered to him in confidence.

"Gallop?" Gary scoffed at the idea of such an absurd notion.

"Well think about it! People should not run if they don't do it professionally or if you are not a child!" she said with such conviction that it was hard for him to not ponder that the idea had perhaps some merit.

"We are children so we can run..." Gary reasoned.

"I still prefer galloping!" she resolved on her case.

"But I can run…" he insisted.

"Well, of course, you can! You are a child." she tried to soothe him.

"And for how long I will be a child?" Gary found himself asking. This was a question that always bothered him. When was he a child and when was he a man? He was always perceived as a child enough to be kept in the dark but a man when he had to deal with thrashing, mending or even with the occasional social worker every Tuesday at six.

"I don't know.." she quietly told him. It seemed like it was an equally difficult and torturous thought for her as well. Where was the line that divided the child from the grown-up?

"I.. I think that it's up to us…" the girl opined while worrying her bottom lip.

"I want to be both. I'll certainly be both!" she vowed to herself and in an extent to him too.

"Yeah that would be nice I suppose…" Gary agreed but he was not exactly sure how could this be or if he wanted to retain a child's vulnerability throughout his life.

"Miss Hart!" came the wheezed voice of nurse Chummy outside the door.

Both children hurried back to their beds and the door opened to reveal the flustered face of the nurse.

"Miss Hart, put the sling back on and follow me once I grab some linens from the storage across the hall." Chummy absently gave her orders and disappeared.

"Pleasure!" the girl told him with a short bow and made her way to the door. Then suddenly she stopped and Gary could see that she was indeed tall and carried herself in an awkward manner.

"Next time…-" she gently offered him.

"Next time let's sing something… Mother says I'm tone-deaf… But I assure you that I hear perfectly fine! Yeah.. so… bye" she said quickly stumbling at words, gave him a wave and then he could only hear the soft rhythmic taps of shoes running, no, galloping down the corridor.

A bewildered Gary was left behind staring at the still wide opened door.

"Sure…" he softly promised and turned back to his now sunny, from the first morning light, garden. As the lighted reflected on the room, catching his attention was a green bookmark with googly eyes. Perhaps it was carelessly left behind or intentionally he would never know yet that silly little object of little meaning would turn to be his safety blanket for the decades to come. That is until she came back to him for good.

 

* * *

**H. What a Soul (Night after the reunion, 2019)**

 

> **'Cause all of me Loves all of you.**

 

She never interrupted him while he talked about a past which had her named one way or the other engraved all over it and to her surprise spanned not two but over three decades. The time to fall into a comfortable conversation was not tonight so she held him close while he snuggled deeper into the crook of her neck and mumbled the word she was always craving to hear. Slowly the last thing she felt was Gary's tension melting away from his tense form although his protective hold on her never loosened. Before sleep claimed her, she thanked her long forgotten Mr. Barky for doing his duty.

 

**The End**

 

> Timeline:
> 
> 2019 (44 y/o) - Current Time
> 
> 2012 (37 y/o) - Wedding
> 
> 2009 (34 y/o) - Gary comes back as a Chef
> 
> 2008 (33 y/o) - Tom finds Gary in Malaysia
> 
> 1999 (22 y/o) - Graduation
> 
> 1995 (18 y/o) - First Year at the University
> 
> 1988 (11 y/o) - First actual meeting

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Notes
> 
> 1) First of all, if you made it to the bottom after reading most of this one shot, thank you! I know it's not perfect but for me it was a great relief to get it out of my mind and into writing. 
> 
> 2) I have a multi-chaptered story in mind which would cover the so-called deal of Tom and which will have more university flashbacks as well as some extras set during the original tv series. Yet it will certainly not be posted until the end of the month.
> 
> 2) I'm aware that Miranda and Gary were in the same boarding school and she didn't fell for him until she was 20 or so, but I took a lot of liberties.
> 
> 3) I have never watched "Call the Midwife" so Chummy was a bit forced for me but I'm currently watching "Lucifer". Tom was deliberately intended to be as devilish as Lucifer and a tribute to the actor Tom Ellis. I have no idea about the man but he is a good actor. That's enough for me.
> 
> 4) To be clear about this, Miranda was the first series I watched but Lucifer did give me some inspiration. 
> 
> 5) The idea for this fiction was born through four things. Another fanfiction, two youtube videos, two songs and Miranda's Joke Shop BBC Radio show.
> 
> To be more precise:
> 
> a) 20 years later by suchfunrockinjovi99 (Shamelessly stole her idea of the first 4 children. I just added the second set of twins to satisfy my craving for them finally having Cliff and Richard. 
> 
> b) All of me - Miranda and Gary /watch?v=1j3mXAy8Wac
> 
> Gary and Miranda - Rhythm of Love /watch?v=b3uD3zgxUMY
> 
> c) The songs: All of me by John Legend & Back for Good by Take That
> 
> Yet for writing this fic I imagined that Gary could actually cover them with the acoustic cover by Boyce Avenue.
> 
> 'All of Me' is set for the reunion party and 'Back for Good' for the song Gary intended to sing to Miranda during their university years but never managed to do so.
> 
> d) If you don't know it already, the episodes of Miranda's Joke Shop are either the early versions of some episodes of the tv series and two of them are dealing with completely new storylines. For this fanfiction I had some inspiration from 'What a Wife'.


End file.
